


That Which Doesn't Kill You . . .

by DixieDale



Category: Garrison's Gorillas
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-24
Updated: 2019-09-24
Packaged: 2020-10-27 16:57:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20763785
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DixieDale/pseuds/DixieDale
Summary: After one of the men experiences difficulties on a mission, Garrison gives an order that he knew would leave that team member angry and resentful.  But he meant it for the best, offering as combined explanation and consolation 'that which doesn't kill you, makes you stronger'.He never anticipated the results, though, short or long term.  Funny how that was becoming more and more the case the longer he worked with his wildcard cons.





	That Which Doesn't Kill You . . .

**Author's Note:**

> Very early days.

Part 1:

Goniff had heard it from Garrison, cool smile on the officer's face as he'd delivered the quotation as he delivered those orders that had sent the pickpocket out into the driving rain. 

"Relax, Goniff. Just look at it this way. 'That which doesn't kill you, makes you stronger.' The obstacle course, now. The whole thing, start to finish. Sergeant Major Rawlins will be watching. Go. That's an order!"

Now he snarled it himself, though hardly with the same inflection, once he picked himself up out of the mud for yet the third time. 

"Ruddy 'ell! 'That which doesn't kill you, makes you stronger' my arse! I think you ARE trying to kill me, that's w'at I think! I ain't running that course in the rain again, Warden. Ain't gonna 'appen!" 

He'd been spitting mud out of his mouth, wiping it out of his eyes and hair since that first curve, where he'd lost his footing, and it had only gotten worse the farther he went. His clothes were totally saturated with the sticky substance, his caked boots felt like they weighed a ton. He was, quite simply, a mud man in motion. 

Or, at the moment, a mud man NOT in motion as he glared defiantly at the big house where he knew Garrison was watching from the library window. He was really tempted to include a hand gesture along with the glare, but decided he'd probably better not. He didn't have a real good handle on the man they'd taken to calling the 'Warden' yet, wasn't quite sure how far he could push.

"Might end up stuck out 'ere til morning!" he cautioned himself, squinting up at the clouds that seemed to be trying to wash him away.

The others hadn't been subjected to the misery, at least not to the same extent he was being driven. They'd done their round, along with him, earlier in the morning, before the rain was so bad, but only he'd been sent out mid-afternoon to do a solo round. 

Well, yeah, he had to admit the others hadn't floundered around on that last job the way he had, letting the bad weather get the better of him. Still, he didn't see that punishing him this way was fair.

"Aint like I can 'elp being lighter than them, so the wind could toss me around more!" he muttered, as he brushed his hair back out of his face, wrinkling his face with distaste at the slimy feel. "Can't 'elp I couldn't get any traction going up that ruddy 'ill, neither!"

Well, at least he was finished for now, having pulled himself through that last quarter mile only because of the thought of that cup of something hot waiting back at the Mansion. He'd have been tempted to cut the course short, just SAY he'd done the whole thing, but Sergeant Major had positioned himself at the sentry-box on Observation Point, from where the whole course and all the side trails could be seen, and would know if he tried.

Now he trudged back to the house, reaching the kitchen door only to find a dripping wet Gil Rawlins standing there, his arms akimbo. 

"No way yer comin in 'ere like that, Goniff. You'll spread mud and wet from one end to the other!" the sergeant major proclaimed, no hint of give on his face.

"W'at'd you expect??! That ruddy obstacle course is nothing BUT a big mud puddle! Come on, Sergeant Major! I need a shower, clean clothes and a cup of something 'ot; surely you wouldnt deny a man that, not after all I been through today?!!" 

He put on his most pitiful, most hopeful face. The pitiful was pretty much no effort needed, the hopeful took more of a push.

"No. And yer not gonna stop up the drains with all that mud neither. And those clothes aint going to the Base laundry covered like they are."

A rebellious look came over the slender Englishman's face. "Then w'at the ruddy 'ell do you expect me to do?"

A voice came from the taller blond coming up behind the sergeant major. "You're going to take advantage of Mother Nature's blessings, Goniff. You have a good hard shower right at your fingertips, and I won't even limit you to three minutes this time. You take all the time you need, as long as She's willing to deliver, to get yourself clean, those clothes too. Here, catch!"

Goniff grabbed instinctively for the small object being tossed to him. 

{"SOAP??! 'E expects me to . . ."}

The look on Garrison's face told him that, yes, he DID expect just that.

"Dry clothes will be waiting inside, along with a towel, when you've gotten rid of the mud."

With that the door shut, the click of the lock audible even with the rumble of the rain, and Goniff stared at it indignantly. Then, he looked; it was actually a fairly new bar of soap, not the slivers he was more used to seeing in the shower upstairs.

Squinting up into the torrents pouring out of the sky, he sighed and shrugged. "Oh well, like 'e said, least I'll likely 'ave more than three minutes. Course, it's gonna take longer than three minutes to get clean, me OR the clothes."

Chief sat in the window of the Common Room, watching the pouring rain. He'd watched Goniff on the obstacle course for as long as he could stand it; finally the misery in that increasingly mudcoated figure just got too much for him and he went back to watching the sky.

Now, he squinted down to the courtyard, and a burst of rare laughter caught the other guys' attention, bringing them to the windows.

"What's so . . . Geeze, what's that damn fool Limey doing out there? Warden's gonna have his head, running around like a plucked chicken!"

They watched, incredulous grins on their faces as they watched Goniff energetically washing out his mud-covered clothes in the big empty concrete planters, now filled to the brim with rainwater, positioned around the area. First one, then, as the rainwater that filled the first became too grimy, hauling the soaking things out and tossing them over into the second to slosh up and down, then the third.

"With the number of those things there are, it's actually probably quite effective," Actor said, shaking his head. "Though I'm not sure running around unclothed is the approved method, even as warm as it is."

"What are you looking at?" Garrison asked from the doorway.

"Just watching Goniff doing his laundry," Casino replied with a smirk.

"Do . . . ?" and he came to take a look, and groaned at the sight of Goniff draping his now mud-free clothes over various of the statuary in the courtyard, taking time to get them hanging just right.

"I told him to get the mud off, even threw him a bar of soap for his face and hair. I just intended for him to stand out there til the rain washed most of it away from his clothes and boots before he came in. Goniff, sometimes . . ."

By now the fair-haired pickpocket had plopped himself on the rounded edge of yet another huge planter filled with rainwater, feet firmly planted somewhere below the surface of the water, and was happily going to town with that bar of soap, this time on himself. 

Glancing up, he saw all the faces at the window, and giving them a cheeky grin, he waved enthusiastically before getting back to the job at hand. 

The rain was starting to taper off, giving him just enough time to have a good rinse before it stopped entirely. Now he was left with the quandry of how to get inside without getting all muddy again. He squinted, looked around, considering his options. 

{"Yeah, that'll work just fine!"}, leaving the soap on the rim of the planter, and starting off.

Chief reached out an arm, "here, I'll take the clothes," as the grinning little pickpocket perched on the branch of the tree outside the window. He'd watched with great amusement as Goniff had carefully picked his way across the courtyard, sometimes having to leap from one object to another to avoid the mud, and had then swarmed up the side of that tree like it was nothing.

"Thanks, Chiefy," Goniff said, tossing the bundle over, then climbing over the ledge himself. 

"Hey, Casino, fetch me a towel, would ya? Sergeant Major won't like me dripping all over the place," pausing as that man and the Warden appeared at the door.

"Ei, Warden! That was a right good idea you 'ad! Thanks!!! Worked right well, it did! Wouldn't necessarily like to try it in the winter, mind you, but other times . . ."

Garrison stood looking at that perky smile, those happy innocent blue eyes, that wiry frame totally exposed, and shook his head. 

"Goniff . . . ". He sighed, reached over to take the towel and stack of clothes from the open-mouthed Gil Rawlins, extended his arms offering the lot to the blond.

"Goniff, just get dressed, will you?" 

{"I'm going to have to start being more careful with the orders I give him; his mind obviously works on a different slant!"}

Goniff grabbed the stack, dropping it into a waiting chair, then took the towel, scrubbing his head dry first. The little side-glance, that look of pure mischief he gave Garrison was almost, if not quite, hidden by that action, enough Garrison wasn't even totally sure of what he'd seen. Chief had seen it, though; it just reaffirmed his growing understanding that having Goniff around was going to be an experience like he'd not had before. He was pretty sure that was a good thing. Pretty sure.

Garrison, strangely enough, was thinking much the same thing, well, at least the first part; he wasn't that sure about the second. And he found himself repeating to himself what he'd sternly told his pickpocket before sending him out earlier to run that obstacle course in the pouring rain. 

{"Just look at it this way. That which doesn't kill you, makes you stronger."}. Considering the four cons he was working with, especially, it would seem, his resident pickpocket, he might end up one of the strongest men in the universe.

And he sighed and turned to Gil Rawlins. "Make a fresh pot of coffee, will you, Gil? And break out the whiskey? I think we could ALL use a little of both right now."

{"I know I sure as hell could use both!"}

Part 2:

It was a face-off, two of the team involved, one just observing. The fourth, Actor, for his part, was pretending he wasn't even there! Some things, some discussions, were just beneath his dignity to even be observing, much less being actively involved with!

"I'm beginnin to think you're just an exhibitionist!" Casino barked.

"Am no such thing, Casino! Sides, now that Sergeant Major's rigged up that place in the garden with the bricks underneath, with the big tubs to catch the rain, and even a line to 'ang our clothes, and 'e 'ad that little shed moved around that way for dry clothes and towels and soap and all, it only makes sense to make good use of it! Conserving water, it is! Patriotic, you might even say!" 

Goniff's head was high, evidence of how convinced he was of the high-minded motivation behind his actions. 

"Yeah, yeah, but EVERY time it comes a rain??! Hell, it even starts to drizzle, if we aint in the middle of something else, you start muttering to yourself, lace up your boots and head out."

A stubborn droop to his lips expressed Goniff's annoyance with that commentary. (He'd really hoped no one had noticed that, him responding to that voice inside his head!)

{"Maybe a little distraction? Usually works with Casino. Not so much a 'eavy thinker, not for the most part."}

"Well, maybe it wouldn't do YOU no 'arm to take advantage of our Mother Nature's Blessings, as the Warden calls it. Could be Josie, down at the pub, might even thank me for giving you a 'int, ya know?" 

That got him a fierce glare, and as Casino started to get to his feet to express his overall displeasure with that statement, Goniff danced out of reach, adding another taunt as he went. 

"Wouldn't do you any 'arm to take a few extra laps around the track, neither, Casino. Came a cropper on that swing-over last time, didn't you?" 

Glaring upward at the smirking pickpocket, perched on top of a bookcase, just out of reach, Casino growled.

"We do enough laps as it is. Sheesh! First we have the Indian here loping out over the trails every time we turn around. Now, it's you - a few drops of rain start to fall and you head out for your open-air shower! Oh, pardon me! You head out for the obstacle course, where you get filthy, probably just so's you have an EXCUSE to head for your open-air shower! I still say there's something squirrelly goin on there. 

"Now you even got Chief and some of the guards doing it! Perkins said he's carving a sign to hang out there - 'Mother Nature's Blessings'! Sheesh, give me a break!"

Garrison was listening from the doorway, amused at the wrangling over that open air shower setup that had started to catch on, and not just with Goniff and Chief. He'd even used it a few times himself, found it amazingly relaxing. 

Now, reluctantly, he stepped through the door.

"Alright, listen up. We've got a job."

Leaning his head back against the side of the plane, trying to control his twitchy stomach, Goniff had to admit (at least to himself) that Casino was right. The first sign of rain, even, and he could feel the watchful side of him come to the alert. Like something inside of him was prodding him, telling it was IMPORTANT he get out on the course, push himself farther than he had last time, learn how to be as good at that as he was at the second story work and the sticky fingers lay. 

Oh, he'd been angry at the Warden for that first 'punishment' of working the track in the rain, but it hadn't taken but one other such instance before he was heading out on his own. Wasn't but three or four more times before he noticed he was managing the curves a little better, even when the track was slick with mud or the wind was going like blazes.

And the uphill portion, where you had to half-crawl, bracing yourself every bit of the way? That was getting easier too, enough he rarely tumbled backwards anymore. He was figuring out more and more just what moves it took, what angles worked best, even in the pouring rain, and he had to admit he kinda liked knowing that. Even started thinking out a whole bunch of 'what if's' to test himself against, like what Chief said HE did on the trails. 

"You think it out ahead of time, practice as much as you can, it's not as likely to spook you when you're facing it for real, you know?" he'd told Goniff when the pickpocket had found him trying out some tricky manoeuvres.

He smiled to himself, thinking about how he'd even started imagining Mother Nature standing by, watching his efforts, encouraging him, sometimes chiding him in a lilting brogue if she didn't think he was trying quite hard enough. 

At first she was just a shadow he'd glimpse out of the corner of his eye, a voice that was just a faint whisper; then it seemed every time she got clearer and clearer, til now he could see her easily, even hear her voice clear as anything. Sometimes she would even give him a hint of how to do it better, scold him maybe for not seeing something he should have seen, encourage him when he would get frustrated. 

And, always, he remembered to thank her when he was standing there getting cleaned up afterwards, having decided Garrison's description, 'Mother Nature's Blessings', was a real good one for that open air shower, though certainly not the ONLY blessing he was being given by the Lady.

{"'That which doesn't kill you, makes you stronger'. Well, it aint killed me yet, and I AM getting stronger on those parts. Just as soon not try it w'en the chips are down, but think I'll 'ave a better chance now than before, if there's ever a need."}

As fate would have it, he wasn't going to wait too long before the conditions were right (or would that be WRONG?!), and the chips were down, and he was in a pouring rain, lightning flashing through the sky, trying to figure out how to get himself and Casino out of the mess they were in.

"Hell! I lost my piece that last fall!" Casino swore, searching frantically in the mud and leaves for his revolver, all to no avail, holding back a grunt of pain as he did so.

"Well, doubt it'd still be working, even if you did find it, Casino, not if it landed in all that muck," Goniff admitted, wiping his mud-splattered face with the back of one hand, looking down to where he was standing ankle-deep in mud.

He took a look upward at the rock-strewn cliff they still needed to get up and over, both to lose the patrol tracking them and to rejoin the rest of the team. Lightning flashed, and both men winced at the greenish-silver light that seemed to cause their teeth to quiver in their sockets.

"Ya know, storms didn't used to bother me much; could mostly just hunker down inside, have a couple a drinks, and wait em out. Even kinda liked them; thought all the noise and flashes and everything was kinda exciting, seeing it through the windows. Now, knowing we could be caught out in the open like this??" Casino shook his head, knowing he'd never think about storms in quite the same manner again.

Goniff looked over, not really understanding how anyone could LIKE storms. To him, a storm was just a huge reminder of how big and powerful the world was in comparison to him, an uncomfortable thought to say the least.

"Well, we gotta get up there, so we might as well get going," Goniff admitted, turning to search out a decent handhold to get him started. 

"Well," he said impatiently, "get a move on, Casino!" he scolded when his teammate didn't do the same.

Casino shook his head and admitted, "yer gonna have to go it alone; can't see me making it, Goniff. Busted something when I came down on that last piece; can't use my right arm or hand, and my knee aint doing so good neither. Go on, I'll keep back the dogs for as long as I can." 

There was a stoic resignation in all that, one that the pickpocket recognized, but flat out refused to accept.

Goniff was now on his knees beside his teammate, feeling out that shoulder and arm, the knee, cursing to himself. Shrugging out of his soaked jacket, then his shirt, he made a brace to bind the injured arm tight against Casino's body.

"Alright then, that's the best I can do 'ere. And don't start any nonsense; aint leaving you be'ind, so stir your stumps, Casino," he ordered, tugging his jacket back on, an air of command in his voice he had never used around the guys before. 

Casino found himself on his feet, pressed against the face of the cliff, his one good hand being guided from one handhold to another, that wiry body almost wrapped around him, steadying him, bracing him all the way. They managed the first part, not easily, but managed it, but the next was a longish slope, steep, muddy and rock-strewn.

{"You can do this, you know you can. It's not so different than the climb you did last week."} 

That inner voice sounded more like the Lady than him talking to himself, and somehow that gave him confidence that maybe he really COULD do this!

Goniff gave a deep sigh, rolling his eyes upwards. "Yeah, I know, but it woulda been nice to 'ave a little more practice before we put it to the test!"

"Who the hell are you talking to?" Casino asked, wondering if his team mate was really losing it under the stress. Goniff had never seemed to handle stress really well, which Casino thought was a little odd considering the profession of pickpocket and second story work seemed to have a high potential for stress, in his opinion.

"Mother Nature, Casino. She can be nice enough lots a times, teaching a bloke all kinds of things if 'e's willing to listen, but she can 'ave a ruddy inconvenient way of putting you to the test afterwards! Timing don't always mesh quite as well as I'd like. Well, I've always 'eard redheads, especially the Irish ones, could be a right 'andful," he sighed with resignation, leaving Casino convinced that yes, his teammate really WAS losing it!

Goniff stopped, seeming to survey the area ahead, then nodded firmly. 

"Alright, 'ere's 'ow we're gonna manage this. You do w'at I say, Casino, not one ruddy thing different, you 'ear me??! Don't want to go tumbling all the way back down again!"

They hadn't shown up at the rendezvous, and Garrison and the others worked their way across the rise in the direction Casino and Goniff would have been coming from. All three men were worried; that heavy storm had blown up out of nowhere, and while the three of them were on the upside of it, Goniff and Casino were in the valley below. They'd even talked about it, about the two having to take it slow and easy on the exit. 

"It's uphill, a little steep most of the way, I'm told. You're really going to have to watch it, every inch of the way, especially you, Goniff," Garrison had cautioned. Climbing up the sides of buildings, towers, railroad trestles - all of that their pickpocket excelled at. Climbing natural terrain, especially in rough weather? Not so much.

It was a hundred feet in from the edge of that cliff that they found the two, still trying to catch their breath before going on. They were rainlogged and muddy, scraped and bleeding, Goniff in his jacket but no shirt, Casino with said shirt wrapped around him, binding his arm to his side. Garrison took one look, appraising the situation, and motioned Actor to step in as field medic. 

"Busted it first starting out, Warden," Casino bit out through clenched teeth, as Actor manipulated that shoulder, his knee. "Lost my gun, too," he admitted sheepishly. 

Chief moved forward, careful not to silhouette himself against the sky, looked downward at what lay below. 

"Warden, come here, take a look," he urged, and Garrison bent low, joining Chief at the cliff's edge. The two stared down at the seemingly-impossible terrain.

"Damn! The recon report said it was a little steep! It didn't say it was something a mountain goat would think twice about trying, not unless he had wings along with hooves! I would have tried to come up with something else for them if I'd had any idea! You or me, maybe, but not the others. Sure as hell not Goniff!"

Garrison was certain Goniff shouldn't have been able to make that climb, even with Casino's help, but it seemed the pickpocket hadn't had such help, not with Casino hurt. Yet there they both were, at the top.

They looked back over at the threesome further back. 

"He got hurt when they first started the climb? How the hell did they manage, then? Even if he HADN'T been hurt, I don't see how they managed." 

Later, safe (or as safe as they were likely to get that far under the surface) on the submarine taking them back to England, Casino described that nightmare of a climb. 

"Pushy as hell, the whole time, barking orders as good as you coulda done, Warden. Him not getting far away enough for me even to take a deep breath without him sharin it with me. Would find a gap, guide me to it, shove til I got as good a hold as I could, then we'd go to the next one. Kept repeating "that which doesn't kill you . . ." 

"Remember thinkin he'd totally lost it, some of the stuff he was saying. But we kept goin, he kept pushing me, and we made it to the top and over. Once I got my breath, I thanked him for getting my ass up that mudslide. Know what he said? "Don't thank me. Thank Mother Nature. And Chiefy. And the Warden, acourse." And then he said it again, 'that which doesn't kill you, makes you stronger.' 

"Sometimes, Warden, I just can't figure him out. And he's spouting some shit about Mother Nature, about her being an Irish redhead, 'a real handful', like she's someone he knows up close and personal, ya know? Maybe we'd better keep a close eye on him for awhile. Maybe he hit his head or something."

Garrison shook his head ruefully, looking over to where their blond pickpocket was curled up in a ball on a side bunk, smiling contentedly, sound asleep. 

"That which doesn't kill you, makes you stronger," Garrison repeated, knowing somehow, he wasn't sure how, he'd started something that he'd lost control of the moment he'd said those words. 

He patted Casino reassuringly on his good shoulder. "That's alright, Casino. Sometimes I can't figure him out either. And, yeah, we'll all keep an eye on him. It's probably safer that way, for a lot of reasons."

{"Even though I don't have a clue what those reasons are, I know there just have to be quite a few of them! With Goniff, that just seems inevitable!"}


End file.
